Rationing Health Care in Oregon

By

Hope Landsem

Aug. 8, 2013 11:42 a.m. ET

Liberal states often preview health-care central planning before the same regulations go national, which ought to make an Oregon cost-control commission especially scary. On Thursday a state board could change Oregon's Medicaid program to deny costly care to poor patients who need it most.

Like most such panels, including the Affordable Care Act's Independent Payment Advisory Board, the Oregon Health Evidence Review Commission, or HERC, claims to be merely concerned with what supposedly works and what doesn't. Their real...